Monarchy? Alright, if you must.

 I was going to have a go at the Queen, today.
 It seemed only fair; it’s the Silver Jubilee and as we speak, far too many people are making far too big a deal of one old lady’s ability to not be dead yet.
 She hasn’t done anything, other than draw breath, that warrants a celebration, in my eyes. She hasn’t led any troops into battle, like the kings of old, she hasn’t pulled a sword from a stone like the kings of myth, and she hasn’t made any decent records like The King.*
 So I’m not impressed, and I’m a little sick of all the hype.
 On top of that general irritation, I’m staunchly, passionately against the concept of monarchy in general. It’s un-egalitarian and unfair, it’s classist, sexist, fascist and racist, it’s outdated and silly, and it’s something we could do without as a nation.
 So, suitably filled with righteous indignation, I decided to write about what a waste of time and effort and money the Royals are, and what we should have done with the money instead.
 That was the plan.
 Then I started digging in earnest.
 Turns out - and it pains me to say this - the Republic movement in this country should really just shut the fuck up and get over itself.
 First of all, I was going to use cost as leverage, but you know what? The Monarchy doesn’t cost that much.
 Alright, granted, they cost more than I do; they cost more than a lot of things. But they also cost LESS than a lot of things, and some of those things are a lot more objectionable.
 The Monarchy are estimated (based on a quick Google search, don’t think I’m an expert) to cost the UK £45.1 million pounds per annum, based on figures for 2008/9.
 I know that’s a lot of money. That’s more than enough to do something great with, like fund another twenty series of “Arrested Development” or have the Go Compare man fired into space with a big cannon.
 But let’s gain some perspective: It’s a less than a third of the budget of “John Carter of Mars.” It’s one percent - one percent - of what smoking costs the NHS every year, and 0.5% of what it eventually cost us to find new and interesting ways to maim soldiers in Iraq.
 Contrary to what Republic like to imply, if we scrapped the monarchy tomorrow, the money we’d have left over wouldn’t be able to fund the NHS or make us all better off. In fact, the money left over wouldn’t be enough to fund another Transformers movie. It wouldn’t even be enough to fund another Basic Instinct movie. (Basic Instinct 2 cost $70,000,000. The Royals cost about sixty-nine million, in dollars.)
 So yeah, I’m against the Monarchy. But in all honesty, I’m more against bad movies, and I’m certainly more against badly-thought-out invasions in the middle east that leave young people dead.
 I’m also more against homeopathy - something which costs the NHS £10 million a year, which works out as the price of what? Prince Charles? Ol’ Charlie Boy might be an avid homeopathy fan, but given that they’re wasting the same amount of money by existing, I know which one I’d like to see scrapped first. And it’s not the one with the big ears.
 So let the babies have their bottle. If the useless, sponging layabouts want a party because their leader hasn’t popped her clogs yet, fine. It’s annoying, it’s morally objectionable, but y’know what? There are more important things to be upset about, that are MORE annoying and objectionable, and until they're fixed, I'm content to let an old lady keep eating swan for a little while longer.

*I think Elvis is over-rated, too, but one thing at a time...